


Birthdays & Other Natural Disasters

by BetteNoire (WeAreWolves)



Series: A Hatemance For The Ages [4]
Category: Captain America (Movies)
Genre: Depression, M/M, Natasha Is a Good Bro, Non-Serum Steve Rogers/Winter Soldier Bucky Barnes | Shrinkyclinks, Rimming, Tony is an adequate bro, Top!Bucky, bottom!Steve
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-04
Updated: 2019-07-04
Packaged: 2020-06-09 12:44:33
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,380
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19476187
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WeAreWolves/pseuds/BetteNoire
Summary: July 4th is full of surprises. For everyone.





	Birthdays & Other Natural Disasters

Bucky’s been living with Steve in their giant apartment in Avengers Tower for four months. As a couple. As _Soulmates_. It’s going… well. He can say that. Everything in his life is surprisingly great.

It’s _terrifying_.

His Words had come back, winding around and down his right forearm like a rosary. They’d transferred him to Steve’s Strike force, which was less an actual request on his part and more the fact that everyone gave up trying to pretend he wasn’t going to be watching every move Steve made in the field and terminating with prejudice anyone who tried to harm him. He even still gets sent out on black ops jobs for Fury, which he enjoys more than he’d like to admit, being a deadly ghost, a thing of nightmares that sneaks in on silent feet to haunt evil men.

And now he faces his toughest op of all: Steve’s birthday.

He hadn’t actually told Steve about his birthday, back in March, when they’d just been moving in together, awkwardly getting used to being in each other’s space 24/7: Steve complaining how SHIELD’s best sniper could miss the damn laundry hamper so many times; Bucky deliberately messing up the perfectly spaced parallels of Steve’s toiletries on the bathroom shelf in retaliation. And Steve hadn’t met his family yet because Bucky just… couldn’t deal with that. (He also knew his mom would somehow let the secret slip to the entire synagogue about her son being soulmates with Captain America. Bucky was still a ghost, and the world still thought Sharon was Steve’s Soulmate. Pretty, perfect Sharon.)

But things were grand, in a sort of “this will all end in disaster at some point very soon but he’s happy to continue riding in the humvee of love until it inevitably hits the IED of his inadequacies and the whole relationship gets blown to hell in a hand-basket” way.

And July 4th is the holiday of explosions.

Bucky wasn’t going down without a fight, though. He was going to give his Soulmate the best surprise birthday dinner Steve had ever had, so even when it all fell apart, he could point to that, and think, _I did good once_.

He hired out a whole restaurant to do it. Well, Tony did. (Actually, it was Pepper, using Tony’s money.) But Bucky picked the place: a Mexican restaurant in Red Hook, in an old townhouse, that served proper Mexico City Mexican (not Tex-Mex), and had a rooftop right at the edge of the water, overlooking Lower Manhattan. It would give a perfect view of the fireworks.

He and Steve would have an actual date. In public. Well, the waitstaff had all signed ironclad NDAs, and there would be no actual other people on the rooftop with them. But still. With a colossal amount of money coupled with vague but sinister threats from one of America’s shadiest intelligence agencies, Bucky had created an environment in which Captain America could just be a normal guy out with his soulmate for a birthday date.

Thing is, Steve was due at the restaurant 20 minutes ago.

Bucky sits at his rooftop table, vibrating with nerves so badly he can’t feel the bond, doesn’t know if Steve is in danger or just… something else had gone wrong.

He stops seeing how slowly he can pass his flesh fingers through the candle flame, and texts Natasha.

She doesn’t answer.

After 40 minutes, Bucky texts Tony. He’s shaking out of his skin with embarrassment and shame, and the waitstaff have been giving him pitying looks and free tequila.

An hour in, Tony calls back. “Uh, Buckaroo, don’t freak out, but something’s happened to Steve.”

Bucky, internally, immediately freaks out. “Is he injured?”

“Nnno,” Tony says slowly. “He’s… fine.”

Oh. So he just doesn’t want to see Bucky. “Where is he?” Bucky stutters.

“We… don’t know,” Tony says, too slow, too careful. “Look, Taxi Driver, we need your help.”

Bucky scoops the big bouquet of wilting sunflowers off the Steve’s chair and slinks out, smiling apologetically at the waitstaff. He hops on his motorcycle (well, Tony’s motorcycle, but Tony never uses it) and is at Avengers tower in less than 20 minutes.

The Avengers, minus Steve but plus Dr Strange (and that NEVER bodes well) are standing around the big double-height common room that overlooks the East River, looking embarrassed. Bucky tosses his wind-battered bouquet on the sofa and runs a hand through his hair, trying to fluff it back into shape from where the helmet messed it up. “What’s going on,” he says.

“Steve got hit with a stray spell,” Tony squeaks.

Bucky glares at Dr Strange, the plates on his arm rippling and resetting into Combat Mode. “Is he still in this dimension,” Bucky says, drawing out each word slowly.

“Yeeees,” Dr Strange says, which isn’t really a complete answer, as he takes a step back, putting Thor between him and Bucky.

Bucky narrows his eyes at all off them, and hisses, “I am this close to the blackest mood I’ve ever been in and I do not have the capacity right now to play animal vegetable or mineral with where my soulmate is. And I can’t feel the bond. So talk, or I’m going to start breaking things. And people.”

Dr Strange presses his thin lips together, in his weird lantern face. “Steve was turned back into the man he was in 1942.”

“He’s fine!” Tony exclaims. “He’s totally fine. Just… _smaller_. And then he left. Before we had a chance to corral him to the restaurant. We’re working on finding him. Everything is fine!”

Bucky pulls out his phone and checks it for the approximately four millionth time in the past hour. “Okay. Well. Assuming he also didn’t get turned back into a man who only remembers the phone numbers he had in 1942, he hasn’t called me. Or texted.” Bucky shoves his phone back in his jeans (the nice ones, the skinny ones that hug his ass and thighs and that make Steve go a bit cockeyed) and smiles at everyone, wolflike. “So I guess he finally got what he wanted and is free of all of us.”

He’s about to storm out when Natasha quietly materialises at his side. “Don’t spiral,” she whispers.

“Too late,” Bucky sings. He can feel the pressure building behind his eyes and he needs to get out of there ASAP before he does anything overly emotional and embarraassing.

“You have your emergency antidepressants?” Natasha asks.

Bucky sighs. “Took ‘em in before I left, they don’t work any more, fuck the serum.” Then he looks over his shoulder at the Avengers, who are all staring at him. “Okay, bye, good luck, I’m sure I’ll see you soon on an op, through crosshairs or something.”

“We need your help, Bucky,” Tony says, his tone serious.

Bucky gives up on keeping his emotions bottled up when he feels the first tears spill down over his cheekbones. He wipes at them with the back of his hand, realises he’s still holding all the flowers when he gets a face full of petals, throws the flowers in the nearest bin and sighs back at Tony, “I can’t help. Bond’s gone. M’ not gonna be any use.”

“Listen, Buckaroo,” Tony grits out, “before you back to your childhood room in Bay Ridge and blast MCR, as a totally impartial observer let me tell you that bond or no bond, Steve loves you, and cares about you more than I’ve ever seen him care about anyone. The fact you annoy the daylights out of him is just an added bonus for me.”

Bucky groans.

“It’s true,” says Sam. “Every one of the favorites on his phone’s camera roll is a pic of you, and I have to see the soppy expression on his face as he flips through them all on the Quinjet on the way to missions.” Sam wrinkles his nose. “He strokes your face on the screen, it’s weird.”

“Yeah and then he sorta… shifts and readjusts himself when he’s putting his phone away in his belt pouch, like _sure_ , Captain Subtle, nobody can see what’s going on,” Clint adds.

Natasha smiles. “He’ll never be a spy, bless him.”

“You’re sure he’s not in any danger, or kidnapped, or lying in an asthma ward somewhere,” Bucky says to Tony.

“Those aren’t a thing any more,” Tony says. “Asthma wards. We have medicine now, not leeches, or whatever they had in his day.”

“We’re monitoring hospitals,” Natasha says. “And of course SHIELD’s facial recognition software is running through every camera and social media image and iCloud upload in a 250-mile radius.” Natasha holds up her own phone. “Anyone so much as remotely looks like Steve, I’ll know their location instantly. And Steve might think he’s great at avoiding cameras but…” Natasha just shakes her head.

Bucky shrugs. “Like I said before. I’m no use. And the evidence is clear. He doesn’t want to be with me tonight.”

Then there’s a colossal BANG and the sky over the East River explodes into chrysanthemums of pink, yellow and green fire.

Bucky comes back to himself with his back pressed against the back of the sofa, a Sig-Sauer in one hand and a combat knife in the other. “Oh, great,” he sighs, as the fireworks pop and whistle through the air in the near distance. “Every veteran’s favourite holiday.” He gets to his feet, shaky as a newborn foal, if newborn foals also really liked murder. “Before everyone asks, I’m not okay.”

Natasha’s cool little hand is on his elbow, his human one. She’s the only one who dares approach him. “There’s a soundproof room across the hall. Come with me?”

Bucky nods, realising how his panic sweat is cooling uncomfortably on his skin.

“Where did that even come from?” He hears Tony say behind him.

Bucky looks dumbly down at the gun and then at Tony, who’s gesturing at Bucky’s skinny jeans and slim (okay, tight) lavender t-shirt. He points at his boot and then tugs up the hem of his jeans, tucking the gun back into the holster at his ankle.

“Nice t-shirt, by the way,” Clint says, then a moment later, “Hey, I think that’s _my_ t-shirt.”

“You can deal with all of this tomorrow, Bucky,” Natasha says. “After all, how much trouble can Steve Rogers get into, in one night?”

Bucky groans as Natasha leads him out of the room and down the hall into a windowless room where the floor and ceiling curve into the walls softly and seamlessly. There’s no direct light, just a gentle glow from the walls, and a padded table in the centre of the room. Bucky immediately feels better away from the people and the noise of the fireworks.

“You want white noise? Rain sounds, or wave sounds or whale song?” Natasha says. Bucky’s 90% sure she’s just fucking with him at this point, and he appreciates it, how she’s cracking jokes, instead of babying him.

“You put on whale song, and I’m gonna expect a massage,” Bucky jokes back. Ugh, he feels awful, that post-adrenaline crash, his gradually loosening muscles making him realise just how tense he’s been for the past few hours.

Natasha grins and pulls out her phone. “Ste-eve,” she singsongs as she texts, “Bucky’s super depressed because you blew off a big surprise birthday date he was planning and I’m about to give him a naked massage to make him feel better because you’re not around, that’s okay, yeah?” She takes one look at Bucky’s awestruck expression, then stabs the phone screen with her index finger. “Send,” she crows.

“I’ll have you know if I wasn’t massively gay and in love with Steve,” Bucky says.

“Yeah, yeah, I know,” Natasha smirks. She pats him on the hand. “Try to shut your eyes for a while. I am going to put the whale sounds on because it’s relaxing.” She flicks something that makes the air smell like juniper, like a forest, and then there’s the dull thud of the door closing.

Bucky’s surrounded by the soft glow of the walls and the weirdly calming honk of whale sounds, and the smell of Northern forests. It shouldn’t work, but it does.

“Okay,” Bucky says to himself. He sniffs his t-shirt, grimacing at the musky stench of it, and strips it off, followed by the skinny jeans and the boots and the various holsters and sheaths concealed underneath. Then he flops down on his belly on the table and there’s even a place where he can put his face so he doesn’t have to lean his forehead on his arms. Time stretches like taffy and he doesn’t know how long he lies there. Could be five minutes, could be an hour. But gradually, he’s relaxing.

He’s still sad as fuck, but he’s not spiralling. Just lying there, feeling empty, listening to whales.

And listening to the person who’s trying to be stealthy, coming in through the door. Not Natasha, clearly. The subtle pressure change of the door opening would have been enough to let him know, even without his stupidly sensitive serum-augmented senses. So he just lies there, playing possum, until the person puts a cold hand on the ridge of his lats.

Bucky whirls around, snake-fast, to sit up at the edge of the table. His hands close on two small, sharp wrists.

It’s Steve.

It’s Steve and he’s TINY, maybe 5’4” at most, his dumb blond duckling hair and big innocent blue eyes impossibly huge, the bones of his face too strong, too noble for the body trying to contain them. He’s wearing an old button-down of Bucky’s that was slim on him even in his Skinny Vet phase and which he’d put aside for donation, and a pair of rolled-up chinos belted in at his thin waist.

Steve stutters. His fingers are pink with cold, thanks to the Tower’s air conditioning — Bucky idly thinks that his circulation must be terrible, and moves his hands up to warm them — and his lips are red and wet.

“I’m so sorry,” Steve says, his voice shaky. “I just…lost it for a while. Didn’t want to come back like this. Thought you wouldn’t want me.”

Bucky blinks, and rakes his eyes down Steve’s body. “You come in here looking like every art-twink fantasy I ever had, and say nonsense like that?” He lets his legs fall a little wider open and tugs Steve between his thighs, and his voice goes husky. “Steve, I want to do things to you that body probably couldn’t handle.”

Steve raises his chin, and a muscle on his jaw twitches as it tightens. “Try me,” he says.

Bucky’s eyes skate past him to the still partly open entrance. “That door lock?” He asks.

Steve shakes his head. “Nope.”

“They know better than to walk in on us, right?” Bucky says, narrowing his eyes. “Besides. It’s soundproof.” He lets go of Steve’s hands and reaches for the buttons of his shirt. “I’m just gonna…” Bucky doesn’t rip off one button while he gets Steve’s shirt open, and he thinks to himself he should get some sort of award for that. He’s real glad he’s not wearing those skinny jeans any more, as much as they have some room in the crotch, it’s definitely not enough for what the sight of Steve’s doing to him at that moment.

Bucky’s words, in their messy scrawl, still arc golden just in the soft fall of skin beyond Steve’s delicate hip point. He traces them, with his thumb. “Jesus, Steve,” he growls. Then he looks up. Steve is just… staring at him. At his shoulders and chest and waist. And Steve’s pupils are blown so black it’s swallowed up all the blue.

“You’re so big,” Steve breathes, a small, cool hand reaching out to span the hard muscle of Bucky’s pec. “It’s weird.”

Bucky hauls Steve into his lap, tucking his bony knees up around Bucky’s hips. “Technically, that’s your fault,” Bucky says. “Besides, you know the serum. You lift a weight, and bang, more muscle.”

Steve runs an appreciative hand down the ridges of his deltoid and along his bicep and tricep. “You been lifting for me, Buck?”

“Mmmhmm,” Bucky hums, pressing a kiss to Steve’s jaw.

“Pose for me, Bucky. Show me what you’ve done to yourself.”

Bucky buries his face further into Steve’s neck, a blush on his cheeks so warm that Steve could probably feel it through his own skin. “No, I feel dumb,” Bucky mumbles.

Steve slides off his lap and onto the floor, then takes his shirt all the way off. The blue button-down falls to the floor, and Steve puts his hand on his belt, starting to unbuckle it. “Pose for me, Bucky,” he says, his voice deep with command.

Bucky’s insides are melting, and he slides off the table, biting his lip. He starts to pose, and—

“Ah-ah! No underwear,” Steve says. And Steve’s voice is wrecked, rough and rumbly with desire, and even though Bucky’s cheeks are pink with embarrassment as he slips his fingers under the waistband of his lucky red boxer briefs.

“You’re gorgeous,” Steve breathes.

“So are you,” Bucky says, leaning back against the table. A dirty grin pulls at the sides of his mouth. “This permanent?”

Steve looks down at himself. All porcelain skin and sharp angles. “I dunno. I hope I get a couple days, though. We could go to the Met! And galleries. And to a restaurant, on a date, like normal people.”

Bucky’s face falls, a wave of shame washing over him.

Suddenly, Steve’s long, cool fingers are over his cheeks, and Steve is pulling his face down to his. “I know,” he whispers. “Natasha told me when she found me. That’s… that’s the nicest thing anyone’s ever done for me. I’m sorry it got screwed up.”

Steve backs away then, letting his fingers trail down Bucky’s neck and to his collarbones, before undoing his trousers and stepping out of them. He’s not wearing any underwear. He reaches down to stroke himself. “Look how hard I am, just from watching you stand there and blush. Never ever doubt me again, Bucky.”

Bucky bites his lip, because it’s a sight to tempt a saint. “Yeah, but my brain doesn’t work good sometimes. Makes stuff up that isn’t there.” He sticks his fingers back under the waistband of his briefs and slowly slides his underwear off.

Steve looks at him, big and hard and dripping, and that tense jaw just drops open. “Fuck,” Steve exclaims.

And what’s a man to do when the love of his life looks at him like that? Bucky turns his back to Steve and strikes a pose, showing off what the serum gave him and what he’s done with it since.

When he glances back, Steve is leaning against wall, stroking himself. “Now the front,” Steve orders.

Bucky turns to face Steve and poses again, but he can only hold it for a few seconds before he starts giggling. Then he crosses his arms and hunches. “I feel dumb,” Bucky mutters. “M’not pretty. All scarred up. And part robot.”

“Yeah, I know,” Steve says, pushing Bucky’s arms away from his chest. “How did I get so lucky?” He begins biting and kissing his way down Bucky’s chest, over good skin and scar tissue alike, showing no preference. “I want you,” he says.

Bucky moans, grabbing Steve’s ass, running his thumbs over his sharp hip points, over his pale, pale flesh, so soft and sleek. With his other hand, he grabs the massage oil, then he hauls Steve over his shoulder. Steve, predictably, squawks, so Bucky tosses him on the massage table, spreads his legs, and with zero warning, runs his tongue right over Steve’s hole.

Steve keens, but Bucky knows he can be louder than that, so Bucky puts his lips around Steve and sucks, and then tongue-fucks him until Steve’s bossy orders stumble into each other and lose coherence, and the lean muscles of his thighs start shaking. Ah, but Bucky loves a successful surprise attack. He places a line of kisses from the top of Steve’s cleft, working down to Steve’s hole, making sure to rub his stubble along as he goes and, after Steve tries to writhe away from that only to meet Bucky’s hands immobilising the top of his thighs. whispers, “You gotta tell me if i’m being too rough…”

Steve shouts at him. “No, God I love it, if you don’t hurry up barnes and get those metal fingers in me—“

At that moment the door opens and Tony sticks his head in. “Hey Buckaroo, we’re just checking to— whoa, did not need to see that,” Tony says once he realises what’s going on, and Bucky snickers against Steve’s skin at how fast Tony departs.

Steve breaks into outright peals of laughter, and Bucky swats him on one perfect little ass-cheek with his metal hand, before pulling Steve up and around so he’s straddling the massage table and they’re chest to chest. Bucky kisses him as he laughs too, and says, “I must be going too easy on you, if you still have the presence of mind to laugh at Tony.”

Steve grins and says, “I always have the presence of mind to laugh at—“ and then he gasps as Bucky pushes his cock smoothly, inexorably, into Steve’s body. Steve clutches at his back, leaving nail scratches that heal almost instantly, and panting wet and open-mouthed into the side of his neck. “Shit, God, you’re so big,” Steve says.

Bucky pets down Steve’s spine, trying to soothe the shivers that are wracking him as his body makes way for Bucky’s dick. “Is it too much?” Bucky asks.

He gets a rake of teeth up his neck in response, and Steve’s furious, “I Swear If you ask me one more time if I can take it, I’m gonna bite you so hard it’ll last for a week, serum or no serum.”

Bucky blinks at him, contemplating how nice it would be to wear a mark given to him by Steve so everyone could see, but then almost without conscious thought he rolls his hips and Steve throws his head back in ecstasy and Bucky whispers, sex-wrecked and rough, “Just hold on, baby, gonna give you the ride of your life.” His oiled-up metal hand goes down to wrap around Steve’s dick, trapped between them, his flesh hand goes on Steve’s hip, and he starts thrusting up in earnest, all the while sucking his own marks into the long, pale column of Steve’s neck.

Steve is so tight. SO TIGHT. Bucky thinks he could die right now and never, ever feel better than this. And Steve is panting, gasping in his ear, whimpering so sweetly as Bucky sucks bruises into his neck, thrusting down like he wants to go deeper around Bucky, thrust down on him further. Steve’s little noises become words, and he’s babbling, saying stuff like “you know I loved you the other way, too, that lithe, moody vet with the long hair and attitude. You got under my skin from the first moment I saw you, couldn’t look away. Haven’t been able to since, not for a moment—“

“Still got the attitude,” Bucky rumbles. “Can grow the hair out.”

Steve rakes his nails up Bucky’s back then fists them in his hair, yanking it.

Bucky moans, then growls, and starts really slamming into Steve. Everything’s going to leave bruises, Steve’s skin is as soft as a peach and it’s going to bear witness to Bucky’s hands and mouth for weeks to come, but Steve doesn’t care, he’s clenching down for all he’s worth, bouncing on Bucky’s dick and panting, “Yes, finally, thank you,” and then Bucky twists his metal hand over Steve’s dick and Steve clenches down hard and comes, screaming Bucky’s name and spurting between them, and Bucky wraps his lips over the thin line of Steve’s trapezoid to bury his own cries as he dumps what feels like an entire ocean of come into Steve. They hold on to each other as they both come down, shivering from the high of what they’ve just done.

Bucky brushes his lips up Steve’s neck, towards his jaw, mumbling, “Happy birthday, punk. I had plans…”

Steve wriggles into him, curling up into his chest. “We can do ‘em tomorrow?” He says, his voice sweet and hopeful. “Sleep now. S’nice to be tired.”

“Yeah,” Bucky grins, pressing a kiss into Steve’s ridiculous hair. “Does this mean I get to be Big Spoon for once?”

Bucky can feel Steve smiling against his chest. “Yeah,” Steve breathes.

“Am I allowed to thank the supervillain who did this?”

Steve smacks Bucky lazily on the bicep. “No,” he grumbles.

Then, with a few more gentle tired-puppy noises, Captain America falls asleep against Bucky’s chest.

Bucky wraps this tiny version of Steve (still all heart and attitude) in a big white fluffy robe and carries him out towards their room, past all the Avengers just finishing their firework-watching party.

Out of the corner of his eye, Bucky sees Tony start to open his mouth, and so he rumbles, “If you wake him up I swear to God, Stark…”

Tony shuts his mouth with a click. Natasha gives him a thumbs-up.

Steve tucks in closer to Bucky’s chest, his hair flopping in his face, and Bucky takes a moment to brush it away. Steve is so beautiful, it almost hurts him to look at. “You missed your fireworks, pal,” he whispers, unbelievably fond of this stupid punk.

Steve’s hand reaches up and sleepily strokes his cheek. “Mm-mm,” Steve mumbles. “Got all the fireworks I need right here.”

“Hey,” Bucky breathes. “Wanna meet my mom?”

“Mm,” Steve snuffles, snuggling. “Maybe t’morrow. Or day after. Probably shouldn’t look so well fucked when I meet your family.”

“What if I plan to keep you permanently in that state?” Bucky hums, gently depositing Steve in their bed.

“I’d die a happy man,” Steve says, yawning.

It’s funny, he thinks, it’s Steve’s birthday, but as he unwraps a smiling, gangly little Steve from the white terry robe, Bucky feels like he’s the one who got the present.

**Author's Note:**

> Happy birthday, ‘Merica! Have some gay porn. 
> 
> Note: the Mexican restaurant in Red Hook exists, it’s excellent, get seats on the roof.


End file.
